…outside Peculiar, Missouri. The same alfalfa field where I realized the girl wrapping her arms around me on the back of my four wheeler as we watched the sunset, would someday be my wife. The same alfalfa field where I eventually dropped to a knee and held out her ring. And the same alfalfa field where I wanted to celebrate her birthday a couple years later, but didn’t have a place to set up a sushi dinner.
So I threw an old picnic table in the bed of my truck, put all the fix’ins in the toolbox, and wheeled it right into our special corner of creation. It worked so well, I couldn’t believe I’d never seen it done before. So the brainstorming began…How else could I use the back of this old truck as a portable, pop-up picnic? Could I use it for camping? Tailgating? Parades? Hayrides?
But it needed to be more than a picnic table. It needed to be easier to get into. It needed more room. It needed a floor…and backrests. The design ideas kept flowing. As I built and tested prototypes over the next few years, new applications surfaced as well…it became a table, a sun deck, a play area, a fishing platform…until it hit me. This thing I’d been developing could become a stage! One that finds its sweet spot at the intersection of my love for trucks, the outdoors, and live music. And so, Tailgate Gigs began, along with the mission to bring the gift of live music to people and places it’s never been.
I don’t think that building a stage in the back of my truck was my idea. I’m not a professional musician, performer, or speaker. I’m not an event coordinator, venue owner, or promoter. I’m just a guy who likes trucks and the outdoors. It seems to me that someone else planted the seed in my mind that eventually sprouted into the mobile stage known today as Tailgate Gigs. So I attribute any good that comes from this little endeavor to the Creator of all creativity…and I can’t wait to see what He does next.